To think that people who arrive early are as annoying as people who arrive late?

[6079SmithW]

Just that really. Don’t arrive early. I won’t be ready!

You do need a window to arrive, it's not possible to time every journey exactly and if you are using public transport it may not be frequent. I wouldn't want any guest of mind hanging around outside because they were 20 minutes early.

I tend to say to guests,7/7.30 rather than a singular time to make it easier

I am exactly on time if a train needs to be caught or something, thought within five minutes counts as "on time", for me as long as it's well within the time for getting there, buying a ticket etc and does not involve rushing. My MIL was flapping as DD2 arrived at 10.03 instead of 10, and they were walking up to get the train at 10.30. Ten minute walk and two minutes to buy tickets - I thought that was comfortable, 15 minutes' wriggle room. I had wanted DD2 to be there for 9.55 but frankly with ADHD, 10.03 was a small miracle compared to how she used to be.

If you're going to someone's house the rule is 10 minutes late. I thought everyone knew that?

Agreed. When going to someone’s home, more than 10 minutes early / 20 minutes late is very rude imo.

When going out being late is rude, but you can get there as early as you want as long as you keep yourself entertained (not pester the others to get there sooner or make comments about how long you’ve been waiting).

For a meal at home I expect people to arrive about 1.15pm to 1.30pm if I've said 1pm. But arriving on time is absolutely fine. 12.45 would not be.

At a restaurant though you often have to be within 15 minutes of the booked time so I would stick to that.

In my experience the people who do this are the ones who never reciprocate and throw a party or dinner themselves, which makes them doubly annoying

I don't mind people being a bit late, especially as people tend to keep in touch. Not too late. Early is annoying. They're coming before they've been invited.

10 minutes early is expected, it's not very early!

I have people turn up an hour or an hour and a half early to their bookings - their reasoning is that I can just tell them no apparently, but they don't seem to understand that it's interrupting me in what I'm doing.

That's def a situation for the "I need you to leave for now while we get ready and come back at the correct time please" line!

Oh no, I'm always early! It's a real struggle to be on time, feel sorry for all my friends now!!

I agree, its really rude.

I have a client who I speak to once a week on a Teams call and he dials in ten minutes before the start time every week. It really winds me up: its like a power play "I'm so important I'm allowed to eat into more time that you've allocated me and sod you if you're planning to eat a sandwich or have a wee in that time."

I was joining early when he started doing this and I've now stopped. He's paying for the allotted time, he can bloody well join at the allotted time.

Yeah that's so annoying. I arrived bang on time agreed to an early friend at a cafe saying she had been waiting. She got short shrift! How rude!

You do know that's far ruder than being 10 minutes late? Why wouldn't you just bid your time for a bit?

Early arrivers do this too. They are expecting you to be ready and waiting for them as if you don’t have anything else to do. I’d much rather someone be late than early, at least that way they’re eating into the time you’ve already allocated for them.

I'm annoyed if people are too early but if people are travelling it's almost impossible to arrive bang on time. My parents used to come at least half an hour early to events so they could get the best parking spot (we have 2 extra spaces on our drive then it's on road). It was so annoying as they just got in the way of my last minute prep, I spoke to them but they still continued, so I started to give the start time half an hour later! It's not as though it's ever hard to park on the road, they just wanted to be gleeful about getting a spot on the drive for some unknown reason!

It's incredibly rude and arrogant!

It's very easy to be on time, you plan accordingly and you WAIT somewhere if you have to. You can't be that self-important that you think waiting is below you?People are busy, if they give you a certain time, there's a reason.

If someone is retired and inactive, pottering along all day, happy to have visitors at any time, fine. They will tell you. Everyone else? It's just no. Of course, in a public place, arrive whenever you like, it has no impact on the person you are meeting if you are in a cafe for 2 hours before your meeting.

In your opinion. I don’t think earliness is anything like as rude as lateness. Or rude at all as long is it’s not more than about 10-15 mins.

Am early arrival is also devaluing the time of their host.

I often dial in a bit early to online things be sure the tech is up and running my end. I have no expectation of being answered early and it’s not a power play at all. You’re over thinking.

How? They aren’t wasting any of it. They can be sat down with a drink or asked to help if the host is so disorganised that 10 mins is a huge issue.

Every single week? 10 minutes early?

Being early causes me more inconvenience as it’s time I may have relied on to do something else. I’d rather people were slightly late than slightly early.

In-laws are always early and it drives me bananas.

You're not welcome

This says it much better than I did!

I don’t have anything that regular but I don’t see why not. It’s not affecting you. Just don’t answer until the appointed time, which is what I’d be expecting.